The boys and I just finished reading _When Zachary Beaver Came to Town_, which was an outstanding book, though I'll admit, just a little too early for Walter and Ollie to really be able to get the most out of it. We and they have been reading more young adult books lately, and there just is a bit of a jump in subject matter that they aren't quite ready for yet in most of them, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, it's just that I can see how much more meaningful and rich some of these books will be at the right time, which isn't quite now. This book deals some with a love interest, but more than that are the themes that layer through the story--loss, betrayal, grace, coming of age, redemption, coming to selflessness, and then there are the obvious Christ figures and the theme of the baptism (by the town drunk), which would be great material for discussing in a literature class.

I'm just really glad that we can still read together, something that I feel strongly about in our family life and as an educational tool. I hear so many places about how one of the best things you can do to help your children intellectually and emotionally is to continue to read long past the time when most parents stop reading to their children, and this has been so true for us. It is just a special time, and not only do we get to share great books together, but we can talk about more challenging topics and I can pick books that I think are going to push them in some way. It allows all of us to reach a little beyond where we might be on our own and it gives us something that we can talk about in common because we've all experienced it together.

In my own reading, I just finished Nic Sheff's _Tweak_. What an intense book. Autobiographical, it is a very unflinching account of his addiction to meth, heroin, cocaine, and a collage of other drugs, both legal and illegal and the incredible challenge of finding lasting recovery. I lost a great amount of sleep staying up because I couldn't put the book down. I cringe a little when I think that originally I picked it up because I thought it might be interesting to Ollie. This is definitely not a book for 11 year olds--male prostitution, sexual addiction, as well as the potentially confusing message about how incredible it feels to shoot up at the same time that the author is describing how his body deteriorates and he can't work or keep relationships with people and ruins his connections with all of the people he cares about. So I'm glad that I chose to read it to myself and then send it right on back to the library. Still, it's one of those books that I know is going to stay with me for a while.

Before this, I finished that darn 3rd Twilight book. Repetitive. So repetitive. I'm wondering how she manages to get 800 pages or whatever of a 4th one when it's a one theme pony, but still, I have to admire how the first book drew me in and had me paying nearly no attention to page numbers, percentage of book read, and all the other extra-literary physical aspects of a book that have always distracted me when I read. I think I'm seeing some changes in my own reading speed as a result of Walter's training--my pace has picked up in a significant way, and I guess I'm more focused or something, but I will notice that 30 pages have gone by without me once looking at a page number lately. I doubt it's just that the books I'm reading are more riveting than in the past. This could be kind of helpful!